Bitch Media - Asperger syndromehttp://bitchmagazine.org/taxonomy/term/11407/0
enSomewhere Over the Double Rainbow http://bitchmagazine.org/post/somewhere-over-the-double-rainbow-autism-wicked-feminism
<blockquote><p>Elphaba looked like something between an animal and an Animal, like something more than life but not quite Life. There was an expectancy but no intuition, what was it?—like a child who has never remembered having a dream being told to have sweet dreams. —Gregory Maguire,&nbsp;<em>Wicked: The life and times of the Wicked Witch of the West</em></p></blockquote>
<p>This is the final post in my "Double Rainbow" guest blog series. I've had a great time with this guest blog, and I hope that you have enjoyed reading it. As part of wrapping up the series, I wanted to leave you with something fun. In the spirit of<a href="/post/double-rainbow-finding-autism-in-popular-fiction"> finding autists in popular fiction</a>, I'm going to speculate about a character whom I almost included in my <a href="/post/double-rainbow-valentines-day-fluff-autism-feminism">Valentine's Day post</a>, but who I ultimately decided to save until the end. I'm sure you've surmised who it is from the quotation above: I'm talking about Elphaba Thropp, as she appears in Gregory Maguire's novel <em>Wicked</em>.&nbsp;</p>
<p>Yep. I think the Wicked Witch is a little bit autistic.&nbsp;</p>
<p><img src="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7188/6939037727_eacde706c5_o.jpg" alt="cover of the book Wicked, featuring an illustration of a woman's head. Her skin is green and she's wearing a black hat" hspace="10" width="256" height="400" align="left" /></p>
<p>For those unfamiliar with it, the novel has the tone and trajectory of a Greek tragedy. You go into it knowing that it can't possibly end well—the protagonist is the Wicked Witch of the West, after all—but you're not sure how you're going to get to that final, fateful scene. (And for those who have seen the musical but haven't read the novel, let's just say that the book ends <em>differently</em>. But you know what I mean; odds are you've seen the MGM film.)</p>
<p>In the musical, Elphaba is characterized as a guarded nerd, but as she originally appears in Maguire's novel she is distinctly <em>odd</em>. The first part of the book follows her early childhood, from the bizarre circumstances of her birth to the age of two. At an event I attended this past November for the release of <em>Out of Oz</em>, the final book in what became the <em>Wicked Years </em>series, Gregory Maguire said his original manuscript included a much longer account of Elphaba's childhood, all the way through the age of twelve. (A not-so-subtle parallel of the childhood of Christ as portrayed in the Bible, by the author's own admission.) I would be fascinated to see the rest of what Maguire originally wrote about Elphaba's youth, but what made it into the book is enough to support my reading of Elphaba's lifelong difference as "autistic" difference.&nbsp;</p>
<p>Elphaba starts as an unsettlingly quiet infant who doesn't like to be touched or held. She grows into an intense and unsmiling toddler who "doesn't respond like other children,"&nbsp;and she does not babble or speak a word until she is nearly two years old. In one passage, when she is given a small wooden bird to play with, she becomes preoccupied with its individual parts, snapping off its wings and trying to afix the eyes from her fish dinner to its head. This same aptitude for focusing on and reassembling components, coupled with her unconscious aptitude for magic (and perhaps, in Maguire's Oz, those two traits are related) later allows her to create the infamous flying monkeys through a combination of magic and deft surgery.</p>
<p>As a young adult, Elphaba is something of a cross between <a href="/post/tuning-in-daria-on-dvd" target="_blank">Daria Morgendorffer</a> and <a href="/post/double-rainbow-valentines-day-fluff-autism-feminism" target="_blank">Luna Lovegood</a>, with <a href="/post/double-rainbow-mattie-ross-autism-feminist-film-review" target="_blank">Mattie Ross'</a> stubbornness and precocious sensibility. She is whip-smart and sarcastic, but also withdrawn and weirdly fanciful. As portrayed during her college years, she sometimes says things that are just <em>strange</em>, rather than clever or insightful, like in one passage wherein she talks whimsically about turning her skin inside out in order to float up onto a rooftop.&nbsp;Like Luna, she just seems to have a different thought process than her peers. (And Elphaba's speech patterns seem to echo the distinctive patterns of the witch portrayed by Margaret Hamilton in the 1939 film.)</p>
<p>The "...not quite Life" passage that I quoted above has always nagged at me because for a long time I couldn't quite understand it. About a quarter of the way through the book, Elphaba is briefly described from the perspective of her college roommate, Galinda (who later changes her name to the familiar "Glinda"). To Galinda's eye, it is as though nature had not "done its full job with Elphaba, not quite having managed to make her enough like herself."</p>
<p>Elphaba is written as a strong and fully-realized character, so it baffled and bothered me that she could be described as not "enough like herself." What does that even mean? When considered in light of an understanding of how autism is perceived and constructed in a real-life context, the passage makes more sense. In the context of the story, the difference between animals and Animals is that Animals are gifted with the power of speech. It is not to too much of a stretch to connect the idea of being "between an animal and an Animal" to being between nonverbal and neurotypical. Language use is often conflated with sentience; the animal/Animal analogy shows us that from Galinda's perspective, Elphaba does not seem quite like a fully self-aware being. In the real world, autists are frequently described as lacking intuition. We lack both the ability to decipher the thoughts, feelings, and intentions of other people, and the "common sense" that represents some inherent understanding of how the world works. Without this fundamental understanding, Elphaba approaches both her interaction with Galinda and the world at large with an openness, an "expectancy," and with the perplexity of "a child who has never remembered having a dream being told to have sweet dreams." In a neurotypical-dominated society, the social intuition and "common sense" that autists lack are considered innate and essential human traits. From this perspective, an autist cannot possess full personhood--Life with a capital L, as opposed to mere life--even if, like Elphaba, she is a fully-realized and articulate individual.</p>
<p>For all of her intellect, Elphaba is consistently driven by an understanding of the world that is unyieldingly black-and-white. &nbsp;She has a tendency toward fixation and single-minded obsession, manifest in her dedication to Animal rights and, later, when she has begun to lose her mind, to obtaining her dead sister's silver shoes. In her youth she is sometimes overly trusting and, most striking of all, she does not tell a single lie until she is nearly forty years old: "To the best of her recollection she had never lied before in her life."</p>
<p>In this way Elphaba strangely resembles Christopher Boone, the protagonist and narrator of Mark Haddon's <em>The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time</em>, who muses, "I do not tell lies. Mother used to say that this was because I was a good person. But it is not because I am a good person. It is because I can't tell lies."</p>
<p>Of course Elphaba is never explicitly described as autistic—she inhabits a fantasy world in which no such label or construct exists. But as I have argued, in light of a real-world understanding of autism and its attendant tropes, Elphaba's particular brand of strangeness might itself be termed "autistic." And if one reads Elphaba as an autistic character, given her own ambiguous gender identity, the overall nature of Maguire's Oz, and the strong implications that attend Elphaba's close relationship with Glinda, I think it might be safe to consider Elphaba Thropp a queer autist.&nbsp;</p>
<p>So there you have it. Again, I hope that you have enjoyed reading this series, as I have enjoyed writing it. Autism remains a subject of cultural fascination, and it doesn't seem to be going anywhere anytime soon. As long as it endures, someone will be there to interrogate its intersections. Hopefully those interrogations will continue to press forward until they find a voice in mainstream discourse. In the meantime, popular culture is still sustained by a web of stories. Even in the face of culture-wide marginalization and erasure, those of us on the spectrum can find ourselves in existing narratives and push back with stories of our own.</p>
<p><strong>Previously:</strong> <a href="/post/double-rainbow-autism-and-race">Autism and Race</a>, <a href="/post/double-rainbow-mozart-and-the-whale">Mozart and the Whale</a></p>
http://bitchmagazine.org/post/somewhere-over-the-double-rainbow-autism-wicked-feminism#commentsAsperger syndromeautismdisabled sexualityqueerWickedSocial CommentaryTue, 28 Feb 2012 20:58:17 +0000Caroline Narby15476 at http://bitchmagazine.orgDouble Rainbow: Autism and Racehttp://bitchmagazine.org/post/double-rainbow-autism-and-race
<p>Earlier this month, <a href="http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science/2012/02/eugene_hoskins_the_black_autistic_man_who_crossed_paths_with_william_faulkner.html">Slate published a piece on Eugene Hoskins</a>, a black man who lived in Mississippi in the early twentieth century who today would have been diagnosed with autism. Hoskins crossed paths with William Faulkner at some point in his life, and the author of the Slate article surmises that he may have been one of Faulkner's inspirations for <em>The Sound and the Fury. </em></p>
<p>The account of Eugene Hoskins raises questions about the relationship of autistic history to black history in America. The history of autism is necessarily woven into the histories of any and all populations affected by autism, yet what one would term "autistic history" is largely treated as monolithic.&nbsp;Overwhelmingly, race is neglected not only in tracing the history of autism, but in contemporary research and coverage. <a href="http://www.kennedykrieger.org/overview/news/new-study-shows-minority-toddlers-autism-are-more-delayed-affected-caucasian-peers">Recent</a> <a href="http://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/full/10.2105/AJPH.2007.131243">studies</a> have shown racial disparities in obtaining a diagnosis and in accessing treatments. Representations of autism in popular media—including real high-profile autists and fictional characters—are almost uniformly white. The only real-life exception I can think of is <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x3IMP0fwlCM&amp;feature=related">Stephen Wiltshire</a>, and he is certainly less well-known—at least in the United States—than Temple Grandin or John Elder-Robison. A relatively recent documentary called <em><a href="http://www.wretchesandjabberers.org/">Wretches and Jabberers</a>&nbsp;</em>seeks to draw attention to "low-functioning" self-advocacy, but nonetheless falls short in other aspects of diversity, since it features two middle-aged white men. (The film is still definitely worth watching.)</p>
<p>The only fictional autist of color who comes to mind, who features prominently in a film or other text, is Zen from the movie <em><a href="/post/double-rainbow-sweet-sweet-chocolate-feminist-film-review-autism-ableism">Chocolate</a></em>—a Thai woman in a Thai film.&nbsp;</p>
<p>The intersection of autism and race is a site of thorough erasure. Where does that leave the intersection of autism, race, and sexuality? Autism, race, and gender?&nbsp;</p>
<p>I don't know what else to say, and I think that's telling. There's so much left unsaid and unanswered for that one doesn't know where to start. And I am not a person of color. While there is a place for white anti-racist allies, and part of the work of anti-racism is rendering whiteness visible as a construct, the voices of autists of color should be at the forefront of any dialogue about autism and race.&nbsp;</p>
<p>So what do you think? Where do you see the spaces and potential for rendering the invisible visible? How would you like to see the intersection of race and autism addressed?</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<p>Related:</p>
<p><a href="http://www.autismtoday.com/articles/Autism%20And%20Race.asp?cat=1">AutismToday.com:&nbsp;Autism and Race<br /></a><a href="http://thautcast.com/drupal5/content/neli-latson-arrested-being-black-and-autistic-serve-two-years-rather-ten">thAutcast: Neil Latson<span style="color: #000000;">—</span>Arrested for Being Black and Autistic<span style="color: #000000;">—</span>to Serve Two Years Rather Than Ten&nbsp;</a>(click through for a link to a <em>really </em>troubling Washington Post article)<br /><a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ken-reibel/racial-harassment-alleged_b_621256.html">Racial Harassment Alleged During Arrest of Autistic Teen<br /></a><a href="http://moritzlaw.osu.edu/lawjournal/issues/volume62/number1/asch.pdf">Critical Race Theory, Feminism, and Disability: Reflections on Social Justice and Personal Identity</a>&nbsp;<br /><a href="http://www.racialicious.com/2007/06/14/race-as-disability-an-update-on-fertility-clinic-mixup-case/">Racialicious: Race as disability: an update on fertility clinic mixup case</a></p>
<p>Previously: <a href="/post/double-rainbow-mozart-and-the-whale">Mozart and the Whale</a>; <a href="/post/double-rainbow-parent-guides-part-2">Parent Guides, Part 2</a></p>
http://bitchmagazine.org/post/double-rainbow-autism-and-race#commentsAsperger syndromeautismRaceSocial CommentaryFri, 24 Feb 2012 18:48:25 +0000Caroline Narby15412 at http://bitchmagazine.orgDouble Rainbow: Mozart and the Whale http://bitchmagazine.org/post/double-rainbow-mozart-and-the-whale
<p>*Trigger warning for discussion of sexual assault and suicide.*</p>
<p><em>When I watch movies that I know I am going to hate, I always try to view them in the company of a particular friend who has become a kind of movie-watching chaperone. Sharing the experience of a painfully awful film helps temper my rage. One summer day when we decided to rent </em>Adam<em> and </em>Mozart and the Whale<em> as a double-feature, my friend seemed far more entertained by my wrathful outbursts than by the movies themselves.</em></p>
<p><em><img src="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7196/6923913529_ca21935f8b.jpg" alt="A poster for Mozart and the Whale: Josh Harnett and Radha Mitchell sit on a park bench together. " width="500" height="375" /><br /></em></p>
<p>During our initial viewing of <em><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xiRzwhb6d2E">Mozart and the Whale</a></em>, my movie-friend had to stop me from slowly inching toward the DVD player in a subconscious bid to shut it off. "No, Caroline. It's still only half over."</p>
<p>I originally intended for this to be a companion piece to <a href="/post/double-rainbow-more-like-a-child-than-anything-else-adam-autism-film-feminism">my previous post about the 2009 film </a><em><a href="/post/double-rainbow-more-like-a-child-than-anything-else-adam-autism-film-feminism">Adam</a>. Mozart and the Whale </em>is&nbsp;a 2006 romantic "dramedy" about a man and a woman with Asperger syndrome and, in many ways, it makes a very neat thematic companion to the other film. In <em>Adam</em>, the protagonists' relationship ultimately fails because the title character's autism prevents him from fulfulling an appropriate "masculine" role. In <em>Mozart and the Whale</em>, the relationship succeeds because both characters are autistic; neither of them can successfully maintain a relationship with a "normal" person but, as the tagline says, "They don't fit in. Except together." The troubling implication is that if autistic people are going to pursue romantic relationships, it's best if we stick with "our own kind."&nbsp;</p>
<p>The relationship also works (well, "works," but I'll get to that) because Donald (Josh Hartnett) <em>can </em>take on a normatively masculine role in relation to Isabelle (Radha Mitchell). Even though he is arguably "more autistic" than she is (his behavior is much more rigid and ritualistic, and he is less socially aware), she is ultimately "more disabled." She exhibits mood swings, manic outbursts, and petulant, domineering behavior that prevent her from integrating into normative society. This renders her sufficiently dependent, and Donald can take on the role of emotional and financial caregiver.&nbsp;</p>
<p>The film was written by Ron Bass, who also wrote <em>Rain Man</em>. Bass is apparently under the impression that <em>all </em>autistic people are savants, because every single autistic character in this movie—the protagonists meet through an adult support group, so there are several apart from them—seems to have some kind of savant skill. One nearly nonverbal man is a piano virtuoso, another man apparently knows what the weather was like on every day in recorded history, a woman who literally never stops smiling has an encyclopedic knowledge of US presidents, and a kid named Skeets(!) spouts off facts about sperm. Apart from this <em>really </em>tiresome stereotyping, however, the background autists are actually pretty enjoyable.</p>
<p>The aspect of the film that elicted such a viscerally negative reaction from me was the protagonists' relationship itself. There are other problematic aspects to harp on: this film, like <em>Adam</em>, demurs from actually showing any sex scenes, and the protagonists' respective savant skills are annoyingly gendered. Donald is spatially and mathematically gifted, while Isabelle is an artist with perfect pitch. Everything else is overshadowed, however, by the sheer toxicity of their relationship.&nbsp;</p>
<p>When I first watched the movie, I was never able to believe that Isabelle was actually autistic. The character just didn't read like she had Asperger's. Upon a second viewing, I saw that some fundamental autistic traits are there, but they are overwhelmed by what can only be interpreted as severe mental illness. It was during that second viewing that I realized the film isn't really about autism—it's about negotiating a relationship with someone who is profoundly disturbed.&nbsp;And it isn't up to that task. I'm not sure that <em>I'm </em>up to the task of analyzing the film's portrayal of a woman in psychological crisis.&nbsp;</p>
<p>Isabelle is introduced when she shows up as a new member of a support group organized and run by Donald. As part of an exercise in sharing personal stories (a device contrived for working in an exposition dump), she tells the women in the group that she was raped when she was fourteen and how she has spent her life in a series of destructive relationships. This triggers an emotional outburst among the other women, and the initial spark of her relationship with Donald is lit when he carefully confronts her and tries to calm the situation.</p>
<p>Although Isabelle first appears on that distressing note, she is presented throughout most of the film as a "manic pixie dreamgirl." She's a "quirky" free spirit who dresses "whimsically," makes faces at animals in the zoo, and carries her pet rabbit around in a baby sling. "I can't keep from shocking people so I just make it work for me," she declares to Donald the second time they meet. Of course, her behavior doesn't seem to "work for her," since she spirals into a terrifying crisis over the course of the film.</p>
<p>As I said, I was and am repulsed by the protagonists' relationship because of its one-sidedness and emotional toxicity. Isabelle initiates the relationship when she invites Donald out for Halloween. Being a musical savant, she dresses as Mozart and he dresses as a whale—hence the film's title. Rather than developing a bond based on mutual experiences, they descend quickly into a co-dependence consistently driven by Isabelle. She draws Donald in and pushes him away in a succession of ever larger and more desperate gestures. First, she stops speaking to him when he becomes upset at her for completely cleaning and rearranging his apartment (and understandably so—one thing you really shouldn't do to an autistic person is suddenly rearrange his or her living space). He perseverates on the incident and on her, leaving her message after message, trying to convince her and himself that it really was okay and kind of her to clean his apartment without asking. As soon as she relents and draws him back in, she suddenly proposes to him that he take a new job and they both move into a small house together. When Donald (again, <em>understandably</em>—he's still getting over his apartment) balks at undertaking this sudden, drastic change, she says "It comes down to this: Do you want to make me happy?"</p>
<p>It was immediately following that line that my friend had to stop me from reaching out to shut off the DVD player.</p>
<p>But they do move in together, and Donald supports both of them with a job as a data analyst. A montage shows their new life as "whimsical" and idyllic. Isabelle paints trees with eyeballs all over the walls, and their pets—a flock of small parrots, an iguana, Isabelle's rabbit—roam freely through the house. One day, however, as he is leaving for work, Donald asks Isabelle if he can express something without her becoming "enraged." He reminds her that his new boss will be coming over for dinner, and lets her know that he really wants everything to be "nice." She tenses forbodingly, but smiles and acts as if she is unperturbed.&nbsp;</p>
<p>When Donald arrives home with his boss, he is dismayed to find that all of the animals are still roaming the house. Isabelle is in the backyard, surrounded by empty beer bottles, lounging in an evening dress and enormous sunglasses. She antagonizes Donald's boss by acting out, talking at him about impossible changes she and Donald want to make to the house—like putting a giant sandbox in the living room—and dumping her rabbit into his lap at the dinner table.&nbsp;</p>
<p>After dinner, Donald is incensed. When he brings up the fact that his job supports them, and that both the job and the house were her idea and she manipulated him into moving to "make her happy," she back-pedals and screams "It was all for you!" She accuses him of "wanting to be normal" and throws him out of the house.&nbsp;</p>
<p>An indeterminate amout of time later, she draws him back with news that her rabbit has died. She wants him in her life, but she can't offer him any stability: "I don't know whether this will last for two days or twenty years." She explicitly tells him that she does not want to get married. Nonetheless, the seed is planted and he decides that she doesn't really know what she wants. He takes her out to dinner and proposes. "You're my last chance," he blurts out. She completely melts down. "I don't want you to save me!" she screams. Good for her—there's no reason for her to feel pressured into marriage, and it was out of line for him to propose when she explicitly asked him not to. And just because she's mentally ill does not mean that she needs to be "saved"—except that, according to the film, it totally does.&nbsp;</p>
<p>After storming out of the restaurant, Isabelle returns home in a daze and mixes various medications into a large cup of wine. She drinks the mixture and is only found in time because Donald eventually follows her to apologize.</p>
<p>At the hospital, Donald waits in anguish. When he finally asks after Isabelle, her psychiatrist informs him that she has signed off on her discharge and Isabelle has left. "She's in therapy, so she'll be fine," she tells him. (Really? A woman attempts suicide and she doesn't even stay overnight? She'll "be fine?") The psychiatrist insists that Donald refrain from calling or contacting Isabelle—<em>sound advice</em>, after he triggered into a suicide attempt.</p>
<p>But the film needs a "happy ending," so after a "humorous" montage illustrating the lengths to which Donald went to prevent himself from calling, he physically tracks down Isabelle against all sound reason. And, against sound reason but perfectly in line with their relationship's perverse logic, she welcomes him, pouting "I hated you for not calling because you were always going to be there, and when you weren't it was as if you didn't love me anymore."</p>
<p>After this line my friend had to stop me again. "Don't worry, Caroline, it's almost over."</p>
<p>The film ends on an oppressively upbeat note, with the two of them apparently married, sharing a meal with their "quirky" family of autists and animals.</p>
<p>Like <em>Adam</em>, this film is intended to offer a non-disabled audience a sense of "betterment." It's meant to be "uplifting," and "inspiring." The destructive and co-dependent relationship at the center of the film is meant to be taken as "romantic," and I find that inexcusable. Isabelle is draining and emotionally manipulative, and Donald stays with her out of a combination of guilt and desperation. I do <em>not </em>wish to imply that anyone dealing with mental illness or a personality disorder doesn't deserve to be in a relationship, but neither character grows or benefits from the relationship. There is no assurance that Isabelle will really "be fine;" her suicide attempt is just dismissed, never resolved. <em>And </em>her agency is undermined because, as it turns out, Donald was right to assume that she really doesn't know what she wants.&nbsp;There is no indication whatsoever that the couple won't continue their cycle of traumatically pulling away and then reconciling over shared desperation. The reprehensible "message," if there's one to take away, is that any relationship is better than no relationship—especially if you're autistic, since you might only get one chance.</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<p>Previously: <a href="/post/double-rainbow-parent-guides-part-2">Parent Guides, Part 2</a>; <a href="/post/double-rainbow-parent-guides-part-1-feminism">Parent Guides, Part 1</a></p>
<p>Related: <a href="/post/were-all-mad-here-case-studies-crazy-bitches-in-cinema">We're All Mad Here</a>—a previous guest series exploring the portrayal of mentally ill women in popular media</p>
http://bitchmagazine.org/post/double-rainbow-mozart-and-the-whale#commentsAsperger syndromeautismfilmmental healthMoviesThu, 23 Feb 2012 19:52:05 +0000Caroline Narby15386 at http://bitchmagazine.orgDouble Rainbow: Parent Guides, Part 2http://bitchmagazine.org/post/double-rainbow-parent-guides-part-2
<p><em>In <a href="/post/double-rainbow-parent-guides-part-1-feminism" target="_blank">my last post</a> and this one, I'm taking a quick look at a selection of four parents' guides on autism and Asperger syndrome, to see how sex, sexuality, and gender are addressed. This is not a book review, but an overview of how these topics are presented in literature intended for parents of adolescents. Do these texts contribute to the erasure of autistic sexuality? What do the books have to say about gender?</em></p>
<p>It was inevitable that I would come down pretty hard on these books, but in my frustration I left out an important point: These guides are <em>not </em>"disgusting" works of bigotry. They're unassuming parenting guides right off the "Children with Special Needs" shelf of a mainstream bookstore. They're meant to help parents of autistic adolescents guide their children through the transition into adulthood, and in that regard they're perfectly well-intentioned.&nbsp;</p>
<p>The problem is that a text doesn't have to be overtly bigoted or hateful to exclude and become complicit in the oppression of gender non-conforming and non-heterosexual people. Even with all of the media attention given to same-sex marriage and, increasingly, to <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2012/02/20/health/child-gender-nonconformity/index.html?hpt=hp_bn10">trans* issues</a>, it's mainstream culture itself that remains bigoted. The gender binary and its attendant gender roles are still deeply entrenched as "common sense." Heterosexuality is still perceived as a basic, default, kid-friendly sexuality, while non-heterosexual orientations are too "complex" to explain to children.&nbsp;</p>
<p>As I mentioned before, <em><a href="http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/growing-up-on-the-spectrum-phd-lynn-koegel-lynn-kern/1018878077?ean=9780143116660&amp;itm=1&amp;usri=growing+up+on+the+spectrum">Growing Up on the Spectrum</a> </em>nods toward the inclusion of homosexuality (only homosexuality, even though gay and straight aren't the only choices) but the authors continue to frame relationships in terms of "opposite sex," a phrase that is both homophobic and transphobic. (And nonsensical; a person's sex doesn't have an "opposite.") The book also dwells on normative gender performance as a means of "looking good" and fitting in, placing it right alongside bathing and wearing clean clothes as if it is equally "common sense."</p>
<p>On my last post <a href="/post/double-rainbow-parent-guides-part-1-feminism#comment-56895">one commenter</a> asked whether I would expect the text to address "every possible relationship" and asserted that the book is meant to cover "the basics" and that to address queer identities would have been outside of the scope of its purpose.</p>
<p>The problem I see with this line of reasoning is that heterosexuality and gender conformity <em>aren't </em>somehow more "basic" or less complex than non-straight and gender non-conforming identities. And the book's purpose is to help parents guide their autistic children through adolescence into adulthood. Queer people don't spontaneously coalesce as fully formed adults. We have childhoods, and we need guidance, reassurance, and validation through our own transitions into and beyond adolescence. Even if an author isn't qualified to comment on queer issues, I don't think an acknowledgment that they exist and a list of relevant resources would be too much to ask for. (Even big bad <a href="/post/autism-speaks-sexuality-feminism">Autism Speaks</a> does just that in its own materials for parents.)</p>
<p>In addition to the two books I have already mentioned, I took a look at two more books that specifically address "high-functioning autism" and Asperger syndrome. Neither book presumes to dictate gender performance, and both books address intimate relationships in neutral terms that emphasize forming healthy and fulfilling connections. This is all well and good on its own, but taken in comparison with the previous books I find it a little troubling. <em><a href="http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/autism-life-skills-chantal-sicile-kira/1102807940?ean=9780399534614&amp;itm=1&amp;usri=autism+and+life+skills">Autism Life Skills</a></em>, the first book I mentioned, is directed at parents of children with a diagnosis of "classic" autism—children who are constructed as "lower functioning" than children with Asperger syndrome. It frames the avoidance of abuse and sexual assault as the primary—even only—reason to discuss sexuality with one's children, and never addresses romantic or intimate relationships. The uncomfortable implication is that enjoying sex and intimacy is a privilege reserved for sufficiently "high-functioning" autists.&nbsp;</p>
<p><em><a href="http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/asperger-syndrome-and-adolescence-teresa-bolick/1006171471?ean=9781931412414&amp;itm=1&amp;usri=asperger+syndrome+and+adolescence">Asperger Syndrome and Adolescence</a></em>, by Teresa Bolick, only briefly addresses sex and intimate relationships. The author initially remarks on basic interpersonal skills, like communicating and interpreting interest, and then focuses on safety. In one remark that stuck out to me, the author asserts:</p>
<blockquote><p>...it's very important for us to teach that romance and sex occur within the context of relationships. This is important for all adolescents, but it's even more critical for adolescents with AS. Their interpersonal skills and social self-esteem are such that romance is unlikely to work except in the context of a strong friendship.</p></blockquote>
<p>I'm not sure how to feel about that. I certainly&nbsp;<em>don't </em>believe that sex has to occur within the context of a relationship, and I actually think it's damaging to insist that young people treat sex as an emblem of emotional intimacy. I also don't know exactly how I would talk to teens about casual sex. Popular culture has a general problem with wringing its hands over casual sex among teenagers while consistently failing to address the issue in any meaningful way.&nbsp;</p>
<p>In a chapter called "The Rules of the (Social) Road," Bolick offers lists of bullet points that describe the bounds of socially acceptable behavior. A couple of these address gender, and those that do struck me as a little...odd. Under a section titled "Rules for Sending the Messages You Want to Send," she writes: "Long hair (on boys or girls) is okay if it's clean and well kept." That's perfectly admirable, but it's also a little bit random and contradictory, since the same list of "rules" includes "Even if you don't care that much about clothing and belongings, try to match the basic styles with the clothing of classmates."&nbsp;</p>
<p>The same list of bulleted points also veers uncomfortably toward slut-shaming, with "Don't wear 'provocative' clothing to school" because it might "make others think you're showing off your body." The rationale is that schools "want you to be thinking about schoolwork, not bodies," and "besides, who can do schoolwork is she's worried about falling straps?"&nbsp;</p>
<p>The fourth book that I took a look at is called <em><a href="http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/parents-guide-to-asperger-syndrome-and-high-functioning-autism-sally-ozonoff/1103427233?ean=9781572305311&amp;itm=1&amp;usri=a+parent%27s+guide+to+asperger+syndrome+and+high-functioning+autism">A Parent's Guide to Asperger Syndrome &amp; High-Functioning Autism</a></em>, and it's the only guide that I might actually recommend because it seems quite thorough. (Though I didn't closely read through the entire book.) It doesn't presume to dictate gendered behavior, and in the section on sexuality and romantic relationships the authors avoid heterocentric language. The book also acknowledges the possibility that adolescents on the spectrum might not develop an interest in sex, though it doesn't do so unproblematically:</p>
<blockquote><p>For many, such as Temple Grandin, the option of living a productive life without a partner is more appealing and less complicated. As a parent of a child with AS-HFA, your mentoring can help your child understand relevant issues and make informed choices in this area as an independent individual.</p></blockquote>
<p>I can't and do not wish to rip that to pieces, but the wording suggests that autistic people who don't pursue either sexual or romantic relationships (and one certainly can pursue one without the other) are ushered toward that identity because autism itself renders initimate relationships too "complicated." It's an assumption that subtly denies agency and <a href="/post/double-rainbow-erasure-and-asexuality-feminism-autism-ableism">erases asexuality</a> as a valid sexual orientation, rather than a consequence of pathology.</p>
<p>I opened my previous post with a musing on whether the jumble of books available to parents of children with "special needs" reflect a coherent parenting culture. What is the relationship between spiritual books like <em><a href="http://www.barnesandnoble.com/s/autism-and-the-god-connection?keyword=autism+and+the+god+connection&amp;store=allproducts">Autism and the God Connection</a> </em>and&nbsp;the bizarre pseudoscience of "<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indigo_child">indigo children</a>," and practical parent guides? What about the proliferation of books about "overcoming" and even "curing" autism?</p>
<p>All of the subgenres of books and materials produced by and available to parents of autistic people offer a response to the cultural construction of disability as brokenness and lack. Guides like the ones I've looked at here offer advice on helping one's child "fit in" and adjust "in spite of" disability, because the ultimate goal is to resemble non-disabled people—"whole," "normal" people—as closely as possible. Spiritual and pseudoscientific texts that ascribe mysterious abilities to autistic people—or even more grounded, mainstream texts that extol the "gifts" associated with autism—appeal to a desire to find the silver lining of an otherwise debilitating and undesirable condition. The "gifts" associated with autism are a kind of compensation for the attendant impairments.&nbsp;</p>
<p>I understand that it can be overwhelmingly difficult to avoid perceiving autism as an expression of damage and lack. Mainstream media encourages parents to panic. Caregivers <em>are </em>overburdened, not because autistic people are a scourge, but because they are systemically denied compensation, respite, and access to community supports.&nbsp;</p>
<p>I would like to offer the radical and even inflammatory proposal that autism is <em>neither </em>a gift nor a curse. If there's any "larger battle" to be fought, it's the battle against structural ableism. A discourse that fixates on "fitting in" and uncritically mimicking socially acceptable behavior doesn't just alienate queer autists, it marginalizes any and all autistic people who <em>can't </em>"fit in" to a society created by and for non-autistic people. The rhetoric of "gifts" and "overcoming" is just a different facet of the same discursive paradigm, a paradigm that others and pathologizes. As long as the construction of autism as abnormality and lack goes unchallenged, institutional ableism will continue to harm autists, allies, and caregivers alike.&nbsp;</p>
<p><strong>Previously:</strong> <a href="/post/double-rainbow-parent-guides-part-1-feminism">Parent Guides, Part 1</a>; <a href="/post/double-rainbow-autism-and-masculinity-feminism">Autism and Masculinity</a></p>
<p><strong>Related:</strong></p>
<p><a href="/post/youth-and-asexuality-feminism">School's Out: Asexy Teens</a></p>
<p><a href="http://tigerbeatdown.com/2011/11/07/you-cant-fight-child-abuse-without-fighting-ableism/">You Can't Fight Child Abuse Without Fighting Ableism</a></p>
http://bitchmagazine.org/post/double-rainbow-parent-guides-part-2#commentsadolescenceAsperger syndromeautismqueer issuesBooksTue, 21 Feb 2012 20:25:10 +0000Caroline Narby15363 at http://bitchmagazine.orgDouble Rainbow: Parent Guides, Part 1http://bitchmagazine.org/post/double-rainbow-parent-guides-part-1-feminism
<p>When I first strolled into Barnes and Noble with exactly this kind of project in mind—to survey the treatment of sex and sexuality in parents' guides about autism—the books that actually drew my eye first in the tiny and jumbled "Children with Special Needs" section were bizarre titles like <em><a href="http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/autism-and-the-god-connection-william-stillman/1100201576?ean=9781402206498&amp;itm=1&amp;usri=autism+and+the+god+connection">Autism and the God Connection</a>&nbsp;</em>and <em><a href="http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-complete-idiots-guide-to-indigo-children-dir-chapman/1029261892?ean=9781592576371&amp;itm=6&amp;usri=indigo+children">The Complete Idiot's Guide to Indigo Children</a>. </em>Later I looked up what exactly an "<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indigo_child">indigo child</a>" is supposed to be, and was fascinated by the phenomenon. These kinds of works that "spiritualize" disabled children, often with a distinctly New Age bent, are a subgenre unto themselves. In the particular bookstore in which I was standing, they were shuffled right in among diagnostic guides for professionals, picture books intended to explain disability to young children, and practical parenting guides. I wondered how all of these texts fit into a cohesive parent culture, and what that culture looks like.&nbsp;</p>
<p>In this post and my next one, I'm taking a quick look at a selection of four parents' guides on autism and Asperger syndrome, to see how sex, sexuality, and gender are addressed. This is not a book review, but an overview of how these topics are presented in literature intended for parents of adolescents. Do these texts contribute to the erasure of autistic sexuality? What do the books have to say about gender?</p>
<p>In <em><a href="http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/autism-life-skills-chantal-sicile-kira/1102807940?ean=9780399534614&amp;itm=1&amp;usri=autism+and+life+skills">Autism Life Skills</a></em>, by Chantal Sicile-Kira, the first and only substantive discussion of sexuality is brought up in the context of bullying and abuse.&nbsp;Sexual and otherwise intimate relationships are <em>not </em>discussed in the chapter on "Social Relationships." The book doesn't offer any advice at all that addresses autistic sexuality in the context of healthy relationships, even though the author mentions off-handedly that sex is the topic she is asked about most frequently at autism conferences.&nbsp;As with the information on sex I found on the&nbsp;<a href="/post/autism-speaks-sexuality-feminism">Autism Speaks website</a>, the overall impression is that avoiding abuse or assault is the&nbsp;<em>primary&nbsp;</em>reason to educate autistic youth about sex.</p>
<p><em><a href="http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/growing-up-on-the-spectrum-phd-lynn-koegel-lynn-kern/1018878077?ean=9780143116660&amp;itm=1&amp;usri=growing+up+on+the+spectrum">Growing Up on the Spectrum</a></em>, by Lisa Kern Koegel and Claire LaZebnik, has much more to offer on the topic of sexuality, with an entire sextion dedicated to "Making and Maintaining Successful Romantic Relationships." The two authors are an autism researcher and a novelist (who happens to have an autistic son), respectively. The format of the book is highly stylized, with each contributor's work designated by italic, bold, or regular text. LaZebnik the novelist offers personal anecdotes while Koegel grounds the text with professional advice. LaZebnik's son, Andrew, also offers his own stories throughout the book, though he is not credited as a co-author.</p>
<p>The "Romantic Relationships" section on&nbsp;the whole tries very hard to be meaningful and thorough. Koegel even makes an attempt at including same-sex relationships, remarking:</p>
<blockquote><p>One quick note: in both this chapter and the following one on sexuality, we often talk about the "opposite sex." We're simply using this a short-hand for any romantic object—it's important to remember that as far as we know, the prevalence of homosexuality is the same for people on the spectrum as it is for typical people. Any advice we have about romantic or sexual relationships is as true for a homosexual relationship as it would be for a heterosexual one...</p></blockquote>
<p>I don't see why, if the authors understand the problematic nature of talking about "the opposite sex" they would persist in using the phrase as "shorthand." It's still heterocentric. While I nonetheless have to appreciate the gesture of nodding toward inclusion—only because queer autists are usually just erased—homosexual relationships are <em>not </em>the same as heterosexual relationships. There is advice to offer specific to gay experiences, not just in the realm of sex and romantic relationships but with regard to social skills in general. Homophobia is everywhere, and while every guide I've looked at includes some discussion of bullying, none of them address homophobia and they certainly don't address transphobia.&nbsp;</p>
<p>When it comes to gender, the entire book is as normative as can be. Offering advice on talking to girls about their appearance and "looking attractive," Koegel recommends that parents look to fashion magazines to give their daughters a template. The section on sexual and romantic relationships includes several pages on puberty, and just like in <em><a href="/post/double-rainbow-aspergers-and-girls-feminism-autism-books">Asperger's and Girls</a></em>, shaving comes up, this time couched in even more troubling language.</p>
<blockquote><p>...for girls, hair starts growing in lots of socially unacceptable places (well, unacceptable in our society—in Europe, she can probably get away with hairy armpits). Your daughter needs to learn to shave her underarms (the hair there can harbor bacteria and lead to body odor) and her legs. If you find she just isn't remembering to shave, start a self-management program. Shaving needs to be a regular part of her routine...</p></blockquote>
<p>The passage doesn't say "Let your daughter know that not shaving can lead to problems with her peers because women are expected to shave." (I don't even understand the inclusion of the "bacteria" remark; the authors don't ever suggest that <em>men </em>shave their underarms for the sake of cleanliness.) The passage says "Your daughter <em>has </em>to shave because our society considers body hair on females unacceptable. Find a way to make her do it." Many girls and women shave; that's fine. But in this case, in this hypothetical exchange between parent and daughter, what if the daughter doesn't <em>want </em>to perform normative femininity? What if she <em>can't</em>?&nbsp;What if she's masculine? What if this "daughter" is really a son? Beyond just tacitly accepting normative gender roles, the authors erase the experiences of and participate in the oppression of non gender normative autists.&nbsp;</p>
<p>The marginalization continues in another chapter that directly addresses "Walking Out the Door Looking Good." By "good" the authors (by their own admission) mean more or less like everyone else. "An easy way to stick out like a sore thumb, without even having to say anything, is by looking different from the other kids." The authors do address basic hygiene like bathing, but they go much further when it comes to things like clothing and makeup. Koegel specfically really dwells on the topic of makeup, conceding that "it's hardly a requirement" but still urging parents to&nbsp;</p>
<blockquote><p>...talk to your daughter about wearing a little for special occasions, like school parties or commencement. We worked with a &nbsp;college student who never wore makeup and didn't seem to care about it at all. Years later she visited to say hello and had a dozen or so long and unattractive whiskers on her face and still no makeup... Again, teaching your child to use a little strategically applied makeup can help her fit in and look like her peers.&nbsp;</p></blockquote>
<p>Koegel advises parents to invite a typical friend over for a "game of makeover" after which they can "buy both your daughter and her friend little gifts of cosmetics—your daughter will then have something you can urge her to wear for special occasions."</p>
<p>I included the lines about the college student because they confuse me a little (What's the point of the anecdote, exactly? There's no remark on how a few "whiskers" have negatively affected the woman's life) and because I flinched while reading it. I felt like the student could have been me. But here's the thing: I don't wear makeup or undertake any other trappings of normative femininity because <em>I'm a butch lesbian</em>. How awkward, feeling like I have to shout it, but that's the effect of this kind of writing. What <em>about </em>the girls who are butch? Or who just don't want to wear makeup for <em>any</em> reason? What about the <em>boys </em>who do want to wear makeup? I find myself reacting so stridently because the markers of my identity aren't just being erased before my eyes, they're being dismissed as socially "unacceptable."</p>
<p>Resisting the cultural fixation on appearance and rigid gender roles isn't some kind of "larger fight" separate from the issues of raising and guiding autistic youth. Autists are part of the same society and subject to the same institutional structures as non-autistic people, and we have just as much of a stake in resistance. When the body of literature and knowledge that seeks to address autistic people leaves out discussions of gender—and accepts and reinforces sexist, heterocentric, and transphobic ideologies—it excludes and oppresses members of the very population that it purports to serve.&nbsp;</p>
<p>Previously: <a href="/post/double-rainbow-autism-and-masculinity-feminism">Autism and Masculinity</a>, <a href="/post/double-rainbow-valentines-day-fluff-autism-feminism">Valentine's Day Fluff</a></p>
http://bitchmagazine.org/post/double-rainbow-parent-guides-part-1-feminism#commentsAsperger syndromeautismParentingBooksFri, 17 Feb 2012 19:40:59 +0000Caroline Narby15312 at http://bitchmagazine.orgDouble Rainbow: Autism and Masculinityhttp://bitchmagazine.org/post/double-rainbow-autism-and-masculinity-feminism
<p>I've touched upon the construction of autistic masculinity and the construction of autism as <em>inherently masculine </em>a few times already in this series. In this post, I'd like to take a little bit of a closer look at the relationship between autism and masculinity. At first glance, I think that relationship seems contradictory: while autism is understood as a condition that predominantly affects cis males and is associated with exaggerated "masculine" traits, autistic masculinity itself is represented in popular culture as a kind of damaged, incomplete version of masculinity.&nbsp;</p>
<p>I've referenced <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon_Baron-Cohen">Simon Baron-Cohen</a>'s "<a href="https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&amp;q=cache:FU5xcX31ZIwJ:www.autismresearchcentre.com/docs/papers/1999_bc_extrememalebrain.pdf+autism+extreme+male+brain&amp;hl=en&amp;gl=us&amp;pid=bl&amp;srcid=ADGEEShTKhVLTKMT9cSMTjqui1WQRho2ci6Ya2dcuN9kfANyegL1_HZQPDkCplmXL_Gkt5dYw2hYilWcBFVrlbHF4FTPzXWPwayMAHbGg0zOxDna6wbe5ulGTZ_4FSqyW6_1CELaAY-W&amp;sig=AHIEtbTJ_kZ0d2I5iO3k8z3bldSqKH7KbQ">extreme male brain</a>" theory of autism a few times already in passing. It's more or less exactly what it sounds like: a theory that autism can be described as possession of an "extreme male brain" based on the idea that there are inherent differences between "male" and "female" brains. A significant portion of the evidence that Baron-Cohen uses to support his theory is represented by research on the potential effects of testosterone on brain development. And of course he conflates high testosterone with "maleness."&nbsp;</p>
<p>Now, I am an extreme social constructivist—I think <em>everything </em>is socially constructed. But I don't know everything and I'm just a social scientist; maybe testosterone does directly cause specific and consistent changes in brain development. I genuinely concede the possibilty. My argument against Baron-Cohen's essentialist suggestions is this: Humans in general produce testosterone, to an endless variety of degrees (including not at all). It isn't a "male" hormone. "Male" as a category isn't fixed in objective reality. Sex does not determine gender and sex, like gender, is <a href="http://search.barnesandnoble.com/Hermaphrodites-and-the-Medical-Invention-of-Sex/Alice-Domurat-Dreger/e/9780674001893?itm=1&amp;usri=hermaphrodites+and+the+medical+creation+of+sex">socially constructed</a>. Empirically, there are more than two sexes. Human bodies exist on <a href="http://www.isna.org/">multiple spectra</a> of different genital configurations, secondary sex characteristics, and hormone levels. Sex isn't simply a matter of genetics either: There are XX males and XY females, and various sex chromosome patterns other than XX and XY. (Note: I linked to the Intersex Society of North America, an organization which has been defunct for several years. Their website remains up as a helpful source of information.)</p>
<p>The idea that males and females A) exist as discrete, objective categories and B) are inherently, physiologically different from each other obviously predates Baron-Cohen. So does the enduring stereotype that women are inherently disposed toward empathy, emotion, and language, while men are spatial, analytical, and rational. These sexist assumptions also predate the idea of autism, and the condition has been associated primarily with men and boys since its "discovery" in the 1940s.&nbsp;</p>
<p>Despite being understood, in part, as an "extreme" expression of certain "masculine" traits, autism definitely isn't associated with some kind of "hypermasculinity." It isn't compatible with the performance of hegemonic masculinity; in fact, it's constructed as a threat to normative masculinity.&nbsp;</p>
<p>In <em><a href="http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/constructing-autism-majia-nadesan/1101546669?ean=9780415321815&amp;itm=1&amp;usri=constructing+autism">Constructing Autism</a></em>, Majia Holmer Nadesan has a little bit to say on the matter:&nbsp;</p>
<blockquote><p>Given the difficulty in proving the underlying assumptions across gender, cognitive style, and neural anatomy, it seems probable that this speculative line of research is at least partially indebted to some cultural anxieties about masculinity in a time in which early-twentieth century constructions of masculinity invoking a "warrior" ethic are increasingly inappropriate...Given the irrelevance of "machismo" in corporate life, alternate "masculine" characteristics such as "rationality" take on added importance. According to this line of thought, the construction of equations across "innate" masculinity, technical/analytical facility (particularly engineering), and autism render autism the cost men must pay for their inherent technical/analytical superiority.</p></blockquote>
<p>I'm not quite sure about all that. For one thing, I'm not sure "machismo" has really gone anywhere.&nbsp;</p>
<p>I think the threat that autism—and disability in general—poses to normative or hegemonic masculinity is rooted in something more fundamental. In trying to articulate this thought, I'll turn to a quotation from the film <em><a href="/post/double-rainbow-more-like-a-child-than-anything-else-adam-autism-film-feminism">Adam</a>. </em>Of the titular protagonist, the female lead's father warns her, "It's not his fault, but he's more like a child than anything else. He'll never be the kind of man you can admire, that you can look up to...." Because he can't perform appropriate masculinity, Adam can never be an aspirational figure and doesn't deserve a relationship (at least with a non-autistic woman). He is emotionally dependent, "like a child"—or a like a <em>woman. </em></p>
<p>Women, like autists and other disabled people, are often infantalized within popular culture. They still end up portrayed as flighty, emotional creatures dependent on the rational guidance and protection of men. Just as the same qualities that ostensibly make autistic people autistic also make us "masculine," the qualities that purportedly make us "childlike" also make us "feminine." That's where I think autism's relationship to a sense of masculinity "in crisis" lies. Being compared to a woman is still one of the worst things that can happen to a man. Autistic people—particularly autistic men—are beings of frightening contradiction because they are in some ways especially "masculine," and yet also so terribly "feminine." Some part of the fear lies in the contradiction itself, I think—any entity that combines two supposed opposites is scary—but it also comes down to plain old sexism. The "feminized" masculinity associated with autism is "damaged." It's been stripped of its hegemonic power—"castrated," if you want to get Freudian.</p>
<p>So where does all this leave autistic <em>femininity</em>? Erased. One of the redeeming aspects of <em><a href="/post/double-rainbow-aspergers-and-girls-feminism-autism-books">Asperger's and Girls</a> </em>is that it starts, however feebly, to explore the idea of autistic femininity. Right now, with autistic femininity severely marginalized, autistic masculinity perceived as "broken" and therefore threatening, and "feminine" traits viewed as markers of impairment, the entire spectrum of autistic gender expression is in crisis. Autistic people cannot perform or express any gender identity without that expression becoming pathologized, thanks to the combination of institutional sexism and ableism.&nbsp;</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<p><strong>Previously:</strong><a href="/post/double-rainbow-valentines-day-fluff-autism-feminism"> Valentine's Day Fluff</a>, <a href="/post/double-rainbow-deconstructing-the-geek-syndrome-draft">Deconstructing "The Geek Syndrome"</a></p>
<p>Related: <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/05/magazine/05autism-t.html?pagewanted=all">What Autistic Girls Are Made Of</a> (the author incorrectly asserts that "classic" autism is "autism with mental retardation." A diagnosis of "classic" autism does not require intellectual impairment, and not all "classic" autists--including those who are "low-functioning" and/or nonverbal--are intellectually impaired.)</p>
http://bitchmagazine.org/post/double-rainbow-autism-and-masculinity-feminism#commentsAsperger syndromeautismmasculinitySocial CommentaryThu, 16 Feb 2012 18:15:37 +0000Caroline Narby15289 at http://bitchmagazine.orgDouble Rainbow: Valentine's Day Fluff http://bitchmagazine.org/post/double-rainbow-valentines-day-fluff-autism-feminism
<p>Happy Valentine's Day!</p>
<p>I have a pathetic affection for this holiday. Sure, it's a grossly problematic event dedicated to perpetuating the cultural ideal of heterosexual monogamy via capitalistic consumption. But—thanks to social conditioning too relentless and insidious for me to resist—I'm actually a sucker for the popular idea of romantic love. As sheepish as I am to admit it, a holiday dedicated to the idea of "love" (minus the focus on material consumption) is actually okay by me. And of course there is an infinite variety of different kinds of love and relationships to celebrate today: altruistic love for one's fellow human beings, kinship relationships, friendships, platonic romance, self-love, et cetera.</p>
<p>For just this one post, I'm taking a little break. I'm going to invoke the ideas I brought up in a <a href="/">previous post</a> about "finding autism" in popular fiction, and just dedicate a little Valentine's love to a few fictional ladies who <em>might</em> be on the spectrum.</p>
<p>I've already discussed a couple of these characters before in this series:</p>
<p>In my <a href="/post/double-rainbow-on-lisbeth-salander-feminism-autism-millennium-trilogy">entry</a> on <strong>Lisbeth Salander</strong>&nbsp;I pretty much just accepted that Lisbeth has Asperger syndrome, but Steig Larsson left the matter ambiguous. Whether or not Lisbeth is really a feminist heroine is also a topic of debate, and she certainly isn't an unproblematic figure. She kicks a staggering amount of ass, though, and I love it.</p>
<p><strong>Mattie Ross </strong>of the Coen brothers' <em>True Grit&nbsp;</em>was my first <a href="/post/double-rainbow-mattie-ross-autism-feminist-film-review">foray</a> into mapping autism onto a character who is not usually read as autistic. I used the word "mythic" to describe both Mattie and Lisbeth because both of them, in their relentless efforts to exact vengeance, are evocative of the Furies. Part of what makes Mattie awesome is her sheer gumption—or her "grit," I suppose. She is smart, fearless, and forthright, and she couldn't care less what other people think of that.&nbsp;</p>
<p><strong>Temperance "Bones" Brennan</strong> is a pretty obvious choice because <em>lots </em>of fans speculate as whether she has Asperger syndrome, and the show's creator has <a href="http://www.nj.com/entertainment/tv/index.ssf/2010/02/how_tv_shows_try_or_choose_not.html">conceded the possibility</a>. I don't watch <em>Bones </em>regularly, but when I find myself in front of a TV and it happens to be on, I enjoy watching it. It's ridiculous, but so what? Because the show is carried pretty much entirely by the sexual tension between the protagonists, Bones' character is unfortunately defined by her relationship with a man. Nonetheless, she's brilliant at her job and generally doesn't take anybody's shit.&nbsp;</p>
<p><strong>Pearl Prynne </strong>of Natheniel Hawthorne's <em>The Scarlet Letter&nbsp;</em>seems like a random choice, I know. But she's a really weird kid. Her strangeness is manifest in her socially inappropriate bluntness, her apparent fearlessness, her disconcerting insight, and her fixation on the titular scarlet letter affixed to her mother's breast. Pearl is deliberately portrayed as "otherworldly" in the text. Autism didn't exist in the 1600's, but Pearl's particular brand of strangeness might, in a contemporary context, possibly be understood as autistic.</p>
<p>Of course Hawthorne meant for Pearl's oddness to be symbolically linked to Arthur Dimmesdale's denial of his affair with Hester. At the novel's climax when Dimmesdale publicly confesses and thereby acknowledges Pearl as his daughter, she magically (and disappointingly) becomes a "normal" child, wholly of the human realm, as if a spell has been broken. She leaves America and eventually marries into English aristocracy—or so we're led to believe. Of course there's always room for re-interpretation and re-imagination. In the spirit of <em><a href="http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/third-witch-rebecca-reisert/1100307328?ean=9780743417723&amp;itm=11&amp;usri=the+third+witch">The Third Witch</a></em> and <em><a href="http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/thornfield-hall-emma-tennant/1100616770?ean=9780061239885&amp;itm=1&amp;usri=thornfield+hall">Thornfield Hall</a></em>, perhaps someone ought to write a novel that features an adult Pearl Prynne as an eccentric and self-possessed American wandering Europe in the late seventeenth century.&nbsp;</p>
<p><strong>Luna Lovegood. </strong>Does anything more need to be said about Luna's awesomeness? It might be a stretch to interpret her as autistic, but given her mannerisms and character-defining fixation on imaginary (or not) creatures, it's within the realm of possibility.</p>
<p><strong>Amélie</strong>, the title character and protagonist of the hit <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0211915/">French film</a>&nbsp;about a quirky and na<em>ïve </em>young woman who obsessively dedicates herself to brightening the lives of others.&nbsp;</p>
<p><strong>Seven of Nine </strong>isn't autistic, she's a cyborg. As a Borg drone forcibly disconnected from the Collective, though, she faces the challenge of integrating into human society. She has to learn the social cues and emotional sensitivity that seem intuitive to other members of the crew.&nbsp;</p>
<p>Seven of Nine's character is often derided as fan-service to satisfy the gaze of straight male viewers. When it comes to portayals of strong and compelling female characters in Star Trek, and specifically in <em>Voyager</em>, Seven gets overlooked in favor of Captain Katherine Janeway, who is one of the very few prominent female characters in <em>any </em>of the Star Trek series who isn't hypersexualized. Here's the thing, though: When I was ten and eleven years old watching the original run of the series with my family, Seven of Nine was my favorite character, and it wasn't because of her skin-tight costumes. Like Lisbeth Salander, she isn't afraid to kick some ass. Until she's awkwardly shoe-horned into a relationship with Chakotay, she is competent, self-possessed, and complex without needing to be defined by a romantic relationship. And while she does integrate into the community onboard Voyager, Seven never fails to realize how her Borgness has defined her--sometimes in <em>positive</em> ways. Altough she eventually comes to terms with her traumatic past, she stubbornly identifies as Borg as well as human and remains a little bit proud of the Collective, no matter what anyone else thinks or says.&nbsp;</p>
<p><strong>Ruth Fisher </strong>is a little more obscure. She's (arguably) the titular ugly stepsister of Gregory Maguire's <em><a href="http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/confessions-of-an-ugly-stepsister-gregory-maguire/1100609453?ean=9780060987527&amp;itm=1&amp;usri=confessions+of+an+ugly+stepsister">Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister</a></em>, a novel that re-imagines the story of Cinderella in fifteenth century Holland. Like Pearl Prynne, Ruth inhabits a historical context where autism doesn't yet exist, but one can infer from the text that today she might be understood as a nonverbal autist. Also like Pearl, Ruth is perceived as otherworldly (as somewhat infernal, actually) and it is fancifully suggested that she might be a "<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Changeling">changeling</a>." Ruth doesn't seem like a terribly prominent character for most of the book, but the end of the novel reveals her depth of insight and self-awareness. Ruth is awesome because she puts up with an <em>unbelievable</em> amount of shit without losing her own shit (for the most part) or her sense of perspective.&nbsp;</p>
<p>So that's my modest little list of <em>possibly </em>autistic ladies in fiction who I think deserve a little acknowlegement this Valentine's Day. They aren't without problems (A cyborg? <a href="/post/double-rainbow-deconstructing-the-geek-syndrome-draft" target="_blank">Didn't I just talk about that in my last post</a>?) but there's something there to admire or at least to explore.</p>
<p>I know I've asked before if you can think of any potentially autistic characters in fiction, but now I want ask the slightly more specific question: Can you think of any awesome female or otherwise non-cis-male characters who <em>might </em>be thought of as on the spectrum?&nbsp;</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<p><strong>Previously: </strong><a href="/post/double-rainbow-deconstructing-the-geek-syndrome-draft">Deconstructing "The Geek Syndrome,"</a> <a href="/post/double-rainbow-aspergers-and-girls-part-2">Asperger's and Girls part 2</a></p>
<p><strong>Related:</strong></p>
<p><a href="http://occupyvday.tumblr.com/">Occupy Valentine's Day</a></p>
<p><a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/daria-morgendorffer/valentines-day_1_b_1275278.html">Daria Morgendorffer: What I think about Valentine's Day</a></p>
<p><a href="/post/televism-the-competent-and-awesome-ladies-on-bones"><strong>&nbsp;</strong>TelevIsm: The Competent and Awesome Ladies of <em>Bones</em></a></p>
<p><a href="/post/iconography-harry-potter-and-the-girls-who-weren%E2%80%99t-chosen-ones">Iconography: Harry Potter and the Girls Who Weren't Chosen Ones</a></p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
http://bitchmagazine.org/post/double-rainbow-valentines-day-fluff-autism-feminism#commentsAsperger syndromeautismpopular fictionSocial CommentaryTue, 14 Feb 2012 19:37:38 +0000Caroline Narby15254 at http://bitchmagazine.orgDouble Rainbow: Deconstructing "The Geek Syndrome" http://bitchmagazine.org/post/double-rainbow-deconstructing-the-geek-syndrome-draft
<p>Eleven years ago, an article in <em>Wired</em> magazine helped establish <a href="http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/9.12/aspergers_pr.html">the reputation of Asperger's as "the geek syndrome."</a> As the condition has become more prominent in the popular imagination, it has acquired a close association with computer technology. One could write a whole book on the relationship between Asperger's and the cultural fascination with and fear of technology, but here I just want to begin to question and deconstruct that relationship.</p>
<p>In the now famous <em>Wired</em> piece, Steve Silberman looks at rising rates of autism spectrum diagnoses in Silicon Valley and actually posits a genetic relationship between technological aptitude and autism. The idea that Asperger's is synonymous with technological skill is reinforced over and over again in popular representations. <a href="/post/double-rainbow-on-lisbeth-salander-feminism-autism-millennium-trilogy">Lisbeth Salander</a> is an impossibly gifted hacker. In <em><a href="/post/double-rainbow-more-like-a-child-than-anything-else-adam-autism-film-feminism">Adam</a></em>, the title character is a skilled electrical engineer with a keen interest in astronomy. Almost every time a character with Asperger's or autism is portrayed as a savant (which is relatively often), his or her skills are math-related. Raymond Babbitt rapidly thinks in algorithms. The kid in <em>Mercury Rising </em>is phenomenal at code-breaking. Kazan from <em>Cube</em>, the male lead of <em>Mozart and the Whale</em>, and the protagonist of <em>The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time </em>are mathematical savants.&nbsp;</p>
<p>Asperger's has also come to be associated with "geek culture," and it isn't difficult to see why. The archetypal "geek" is also portrayed as possessing great technical skill, specifically with computers. Geeks are also portrayed as awkward and socially immature—hallmark traits of Asperger syndrome—and geekdom is pretty much synonymous with obsessive fandom. The fandoms most closely associated with "geek culture" are those of major science-fiction franchises<em>, </em>like <em>Star Trek, Star Wars, </em>and <em>Doctor Who. </em>As I have remarked upon in previous posts, people on the autism spectrum are often constructed as "otherworldly" or otherwise inhuman. We are often symbolically associated with aliens, à la Temple Grandin's <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/An_Anthropologist_on_Mars">"anthropologist on Mars" analogy.&nbsp;</a></p>
<p>We are also often constructed as <em>robotic. </em>That is, we are somehow fundamentally&nbsp;<em>like </em>the machines with which we (are perceived to) have such a close relationship. In <em><a href="http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/constructing-autism-majia-nadesan/1101546669">Constructing Autism: Unravelling the "Truth" and Understanding the Social</a>, </em>Madjia Holmer Nadesan takes a close look at this construction of Asperger's and "high-functioning" autism.&nbsp;</p>
<p>Nadesan makes note of the fact that the diagnostic boundaries of autism have been expanding over the past few decades. For example, fifty years ago I would not have been autistic. That is not to say that I wouldn't have possessed exactly the same cognitive and behavioral traits that "make" me autistic in a contemporary setting. It's just that "autism" as a concept is a culturally and historically specific phenomenon, and someone who is on the "high functioning" end of the spectrum today may not have fit the diagnostic and cultural understanding of autism at another time.&nbsp;</p>
<p>The diagnostic paradigm has changed because the culture has changed, and one major way in which American culture has changed in recent decades is the explosion of new technologies. Nadesan asserts that "classic" autism is "a disorder of the early twentieth century, while the high-functioning variants of autism...are fundamentally disorders of the late twentieth and early twenty-first century." In other words, certain conditions could not have been conceived prior to those historical moments because they are enmeshed in particular historical and cultural contexts.&nbsp;</p>
<p>Of the phenomenon of these "high-functioning variants" of autism, which include Asperger syndrome, Nadesan writes</p>
<blockquote><p>The history of "high-functioning" forms of autism must further be understood in the contexts of new standards for parenting that emerged mid-twentieth century and new economic and social conditions surrounding the purported "information revolution" that began in the 1960s. As I will argue, the public's fascination with autism, particularly its high-functioning forms, stems in large part from the idea that people with autism are technologically gifted and are particularly adept with computer technology.&nbsp;</p></blockquote>
<p>Further on in the book, Nadesan elaborates on this relationship between Asperger's and technology:</p>
<blockquote><p>The cognitive research on autistic intelligence establishes linkages across gender, technical facility, and autism, and, in so doing, constructs an image of high-functioning people with autism as possessing an alien form of intelligence that is simultaneously seductive and threatening...</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<p>Frighteningly, representations of autism invoking computational models of "autistic intelligence" draw upon, and exacerbate, social anxieties surrounding technology as a force unto itself, devoid of concern about the human condition. Films such as Stanley Kubrick's <em>2001: A Space Odyssey </em>(1968) and James Cameron's <em>The Terminator</em>&nbsp;(1984) imagine totalitarian control by artificial intelligence, but in these instances technology represents an externalization of human praxis in form of produced and self-replicating machines, whereas in the case of Asperger's syndrome the threat of technical domination rests <em>internally </em>within the human population.&nbsp;</p>
</blockquote>
<p>So the underlying cultural fear is that we're cyborgs quietly mounting an insidious invasion. <a href="http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/Borg">Like stealthy Borg</a>. As Nadesan concedes, this extrapolation "may seem wild" at first, but it really doesn't exaggerate the nature of society's anxiety about technology, particularly as it concerns computers and artificial intelligence. Mainstream news media regularly gives voice to fears about <a href="http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/robot_invasion/2011/09/will_robots_steal_your_job.html">robots stealing jobs</a> and the purported <a href="http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2009/08/20/lonely-planet.html">detrimental effects</a> of social media. And it isn't a stretch to interpret the hysteria surrounding the purported "autism epidemic" as, in part, a fear of being over-run by a new generation that seems to relate to the world in wholly unfamiliar ways.&nbsp;</p>
<p>Nadesan also brings up and discusses gender. Certainly in popular culture, math, science, technology, and all the trappings of geekdom are overwhelmingly gendered as "masculine." Simon Baron-Cohen's theory of autism as possession of an "<a href="https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&amp;q=cache:FU5xcX31ZIwJ:www.autismresearchcentre.com/docs/papers/1999_bc_extrememalebrain.pdf+autism+extreme+male+brain&amp;hl=en&amp;gl=us&amp;pid=bl&amp;srcid=ADGEEShTKhVLTKMT9cSMTjqui1WQRho2ci6Ya2dcuN9kfANyegL1_HZQPDkCplmXL_Gkt5dYw2hYilWcBFVrlbHF4FTPzXWPwayMAHbGg0zOxDna6wbe5ulGTZ_4FSqyW6_1CELaAY-W&amp;sig=AHIEtbTJ_kZ0d2I5iO3k8z3bldSqKH7KbQ">extreme male brain</a>" is predicated on the assumption that there is a fundmental, "hard-wired" difference between the "male brain" and the "female brain." This difference is presumed to manifest in ways that you can predict even if you've never encountered Baron-Cohen's hypothesis: The "male brain" is rational and analytical, while the "female brain" is emotional and empathetic. Given this web of cultural assumptions and associations connecting gender, technology, and autism, I am extremely skeptical of the idea that the apparent 10-to-1 incidence of autism in males versus females reflects any kind of physical reality. The same cultural paradigm that hinders girls and women in the fields of math and science may well be responsible for a severe "underdiagnosis" of autism in that same subset of the population.&nbsp;</p>
<p>Ultimately, my concern about the pervasive construction of people with Asperger's as robotic and alien derives from the ways that this construction impacts real people's lived experiences. We're not aliens, but we certainly are <em>alienated </em>by a culture that refuses to accept that we live, love, and relate to world and to our communities as human beings.&nbsp;</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<p>Related: <a href="http://gawker.com/5885196/the-tech-industrys-asperger-problem-affliction-or-insult">The Tech Industry's Asperger Problem: Affliction or Insult?&nbsp;</a>&nbsp;(I had to come back and add this Gawker link as soon as I found it)</p>
<p>Previously: <a href="/post/double-rainbow-aspergers-and-girls-part-2">Asperger's and Girls part 2,</a> <a href="/post/double-rainbow-aspergers-and-girls-feminism-autism-books">Asperger's and Girls</a></p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
http://bitchmagazine.org/post/double-rainbow-deconstructing-the-geek-syndrome-draft#commentsAsperger syndromegeek culturetechnologySocial CommentaryFri, 10 Feb 2012 20:17:08 +0000Caroline Narby15195 at http://bitchmagazine.orgDouble Rainbow: Asperger's and Girls Part 2: "Boys, fashion, shopping, movies, and music"http://bitchmagazine.org/post/double-rainbow-aspergers-and-girls-part-2
<p>That's what little girls are made of, apparently.</p>
<p>In my <a href="/post/double-rainbow-aspergers-and-girls-feminism-autism-books#comments">last post</a>, I took a look at the book <em>Asperger's and Girls</em>, a collection of essays that attempt to address the needs and concerns about girls with Asperger syndrome. I found the book to be a disappointment overall, but one chapter in particular stands out as especially heinous. In "Girl to Girl: Advice on Friendship, Bullying, and Fitting In," Lisa Iland, a non-autistic young woman with a sibling on the spectrum, dishes out "practical advice on dealing with the 'popularity hierarchy' and 'levels of relationship'; how to make yourself likeable; using MTV to your advantage; combating bullies; the positive role of gossip; and more."</p>
<p>Wait, MTV? Really? This book was published in 2006. Although it's true: when I read this chapter to myself I can't help but hear <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quinn_Morgendorffer">Quinn Morgendorffer</a>'s voice in my head. I also get the irresitible urge to open up the <em>Wicked </em>soundtrack and listen to "<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CsKH2tqoFJ8">Popular</a>."</p>
<p>I'll (try to) stop there with that kind of mockery, because the images of the vapid blonde "bimbo" and the shallow, self-obsessed social climber are sexist stereotypes in themselves.&nbsp;</p>
<p>The very foundation of this chapter is the pervasive myth of a monolithic "teen culture" wherein the "typical teen" operates within a rigid, gender-segregated social system with a consistent set of rules and a fixed hierachy based on "popularity." Sure, there are systems governing the distribution of social capital in high school, but this particular concept of teen culture—which endures in part because it is endlessly reproduced in popular media—breaks down really quickly under scrutiny. Who is this "typical" teen? Is s/he white? Brown? Rich? Poor? Urban? Suburban? Rural? Gay? Straight? "Teen culture" does not and cannot describe a single entity. Adolescent cultures are as varied, complex, and dependent on social, economic, and geographic contexts as any other kind of culture.</p>
<p>The chapter starts off with a set of four "Essential Areas to Know In Order to Fit In." These are: 1. Creating image and appeal; 2. Understanding where to fit in; 3. Meeting Social Expectations; 4. Overcoming Bullying and Mean Girls.</p>
<p>Under the first of these areas, "creating an image," Iland offers up such wisdom as:</p>
<blockquote><p>Things that turn friends away initially are clinginess, obnoxious hyperactivity, insults, and <strong>being overly opinionated</strong>. [Emphasis mine]</p></blockquote>
<blockquote><p>Girls who mainstream their image become part of the girl middle class. Their options open to having more friends to choose from in the mainstream, and they also have the option of being friends of the unusual people instead of being confined to that class.</p></blockquote>
<blockquote><p>Not every girl has to be "girly" or involved in makeup and fashion, but even athletic girls and self-proclaimed "tomboys" follow the teen code of hygiene and wear hairstyles and clothes that are socially appropriate for their image.</p></blockquote>
<blockquote><p>When a typical girl looks at another girl, she decodes her image to determine what level of social status the girl belongs to. The peer then compares herself to that and decides if she should make an effort at friendliness.</p></blockquote>
<p>So, "girliness" is defined by an affinity for makeup and fashion? And being "athletic" is somehow antithetical to being "girly?" What, exactly, does it mean for a girl to be "overly opinionated?" Does it mean her convictions are too strong? That she has too many opinions? We certainly can't have girls walking around with too many opinions.</p>
<p>The idea of "class" or "status" is central to Iland's essay, but she never gets into the details of class markers, instead using extremely vague descriptors like "mainstream," "moderate," and "unusual." This is what I find to be the most reprehensible aspect of the piece. One can't talk meaningfully about social status without describing the markers of status, those being qualities like race, economic class, gender presentation, dis/ability, sexuality, et cetera. In the hypothetical social context that Iland is working with, a girl's clothing might seem "unusual" <em>because</em> it makes her look crazy, or working class, or gay and those qualities relegate people to a lower social status. Yet Iland never takes that additional step of interrogating the unspoken reasoning behind peers' judgements and thereby exposing the social hierarchy as oppressive. She just leaves it at "Try not to look unusual."</p>
<p>In the "Understanding where to fit in" section, Iland describes the high school social hierarchy. As she imagines it, it looks like something right out of the Disney Channel: cheerleaders and jocks at the "top" among the "Popular/Elite," most kids somewhere in the "middle," and at the "bottom" are "Unique/Unusual Groups." The vagueness that ends up overwhelming the entire chapter&nbsp; continues through this section. What exactly does it mean to be "popular?" Popular with whom? Iland offhandedly asserts that "Whoever belongs to this Popular group has what the other teens at the school want," but she never says what exactly that is.</p>
<p>I'm only twenty-three—I was a teen not all that long ago. I recall quite clearly that my (public, suburban, affluent, predominantly white) high school's social structure was far more complex than this simplistic caricature. If I absolutely had to define what "group" I was part of, I'd have to say I was at some intersection between "the smart kids" and "the weird kids"—and as such, the "popular kids" had absolutely nothing that I or my peers wanted, except maybe parents with money. While we had limited social capital in certain circles, the kids whom Iland might identify as "elite" had limited social capital within our circle. That's how teen society <em>actually</em> works. There is an overarching hegemony—manifest in the realities of economic privilege, white privilege, and heteronormativity, for example—but the system isn't a simple top-down hierarchy. And that hegemony is <em>oppressive</em>. It should be <em>interrogated </em>and <em>confronted</em>, not just glossed over and tacitly accepted.</p>
<p>Predictably, Iland presumes that the basic social unit of "girl culture" is the "clique," and she quotes from Rosalind Wiseman's "<em>Queen Bees and Wannabees</em>" [sic]. Now, I haven't read <a href="http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/queen-bees-and-wannabes-rosalind-wiseman/1103375553?ean=9780307454447&amp;itm=1&amp;usri=queen+bees+and+wannabes"><em>Queen Bees and Wannabes</em></a>, but I'm automatically wary of any text that essentializes girlhood and oversimplifies adolescence via archetypes and buzzwords. Certainly I think Wiseman's classification of the seven specific roles within the "clique"—which include, of course, a "queen bee" who "reigns supreme" over the other girls—is far too clear-cut. Also, what about peer relationships between girls and boys? Iland only mentions boys in passing, as people to impress with one's looks because apparently eliciting approval and sexual desire from a male gaze is a "status" boost. What about boys as friends and confidants?&nbsp;</p>
<p>The section on "Meeting social expectations" has some more timeless pearls:</p>
<blockquote><p>When a teen girl asks, "Do I look fat?" The answer is always no! White lying is an important friendship skill to have in maintaining the fragile self esteem of teen girls.</p></blockquote>
<blockquote><p><em>Quoting a "friend with AS" named "Kelsey"</em>: "Most girls don't want to talk about science or <em>Star Wars</em>. Find something to contribute to what girls talk about. Listen until you can contribute instead of just interrupting with the topic you want to talk about. It is better to be thought of as shy and quiet than loud and obnoxious."</p></blockquote>
<blockquote><p>Boys, fashion, shopping, movies, and music will always be teen topics of conversation....</p></blockquote>
<blockquote><p>Ethnicity and gender are also determining factors as to what greeting [sic] are appropriate.</p></blockquote>
<blockquote><p>Beng alone = being a-loner</p></blockquote>
<blockquote><p>Girls with AS who spend lunchtime by themselves should practice looking content and busy in being alone. No typical peers want to befriend a person who is a sulky "loner." The only legitimate reason teens accept for being alone at lunch is because of school obligations....</p></blockquote>
<p>I should have known that being fat would turn up as an example of <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FbXh7ZipUuQ">the. Worst. POSSIBLE. THING!</a> that could happen to a teenage girl. I would also love to know precisely how ethnicity and gender determine what colloquialisms I should use to greet my peers. (No, seriously, that's the context of that quote.) I was also under the impression that it was acceptable to just, you know, eat during lunchtime. If only I had known what a faux pas it was to spend a few minutes alone!</p>
<p>The fourth and final section deals with "Bullying and mean girls." Bullying has exploded as a cultural fixation, and I don't even know what to say on the matter. Iland certainly isn't up to the task of addressing the issue. She quotes Wiseman some more, and offers feeble advice on comebacks and ignoring harrassment. Fat hatred rears its head again in an anecdote from one of Iland's "typical friends and acquaintances":</p>
<blockquote><p>I was definitely picked on for being fat. Although I was bullied a lot, I never let it get to me because I was a stronger person than that. I think that people who get made fun of tend to keep the mean comments with them and start to believe them because of the repetitive nature of bullying. I also knew in my mind that letting what they say stick in my mind will not make things any better; if I was going to be happy with who I was I needed to let it go and have my family and friends at my side. <strong>The true way I overcame bullying was I changed myself, and got healthier, not for everyone else, but to make myself happier.</strong>" [Emphasis mine.]</p></blockquote>
<p>Right. Because if you're harassed for being fat that's a bummer and all, but you know, you really <em>should </em>get healthier—that is, lose weight, because weight and health are the same thing of course. So really those bullies have a point: It <em>is </em>your body that's the real problem, after all. As harsh as it seems when I put it that way, that's the message the story sends: If you're being bullied because you're fat, the real solution is to stop being fat.</p>
<p>In the end, one just has to laugh at "Girl to Girl." It's so spectacularly shallow and stereotypical—and, for a piece ostensibly written by a teen girl for teen girls, so astoundingly out of touch—that it reads like a parody.</p>
<p>Of course, realizing the praise and wide readership that <em>Asperger's and Girls </em>has garnered in the autism community, if we didn't laugh we'd probably cry.</p>
<p><strong>Previously:</strong> <a href="/post/double-rainbow-aspergers-and-girls-feminism-autism-books">Asperger's and Girls</a>, <a href="/post/double-rainbow-aspergers-autism-literature-attwood">Tony Attwood tells us to "make lemonade"</a></p>
<p><strong>Related:</strong> <a href="/post/10-quotes-from-girl-land-made-palatable-by-cat-photos-flanagan-feminism-lolcats">Maybe I should have made the quotations into lolcats</a></p>
http://bitchmagazine.org/post/double-rainbow-aspergers-and-girls-part-2#commentsAsperger syndromegenderstereotypesBooksThu, 09 Feb 2012 19:51:13 +0000Caroline Narby15165 at http://bitchmagazine.orgDouble Rainbow: Asperger's and Girlshttp://bitchmagazine.org/post/double-rainbow-aspergers-and-girls-feminism-autism-books
<p><img src="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7009/6833644177_0ef2a52211.jpg" alt="" hspace="10" width="333" height="500" align="left" />In my <a href="/post/double-rainbow-aspergers-autism-literature-attwood">last post</a>, I critiqued a chapter of Tony Attwood's <em>The Complete Guide to Asperger's Syndrome</em>. Now I'm taking a look at <a href="http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/aspergers-and-girls-tony-attwood/1008122836"><em>Asperger's and Girls</em></a>, a slim collection of essays in which Attwood and others tackle the intersection of Asperger's and gender.</p>
<p>Or, rather, in which they <em>attempt</em> to take on that intersection.</p>
<p>Now, a few (well, one or two) of the contributions to this collection <em>are</em> thoughtful reflections on what it means to be a girl or woman with Asperger syndrome. Certainly the intersection between gender and autism is one that warrants interrogation. Autism is popularly thought of as a condition that predominantly affects males, and many more males are diagnosed with autism spectrum disorders than females. Some "experts" even assert that autism is constituted by the possession of an "<a href="http://www.psychologytoday.com/articles/200401/autism-whats-sex-got-do-it">extreme male brain</a>." (A concept that warrants a post all to itself.)</p>
<p>Tony Attwood starts off the collection (he is unbearably referred to as the "world's foremost authority on the subject of Asperger's syndrome" on the back of the book) and his piece actually isn't awful. It isn't particularly substantive or well-developed either—it's a disjointed collection of Attwood's thoughts about why girls might be under-diagnosed, and how girls and women with Asperger syndrome might present differently from men and boys. The piece, titled "<a href="http://www.tonyattwood.com.au/index.php?Itemid=181&amp;catid=45:archived-resource-papers&amp;id=80:the-pattern-of-abilities-and-development-of-girls-with-aspergers-syndrome&amp;option=com_content&amp;view=article">The Pattern of Abilities and Development of Girls with Asperger's Syndrome</a>," essentially lists behavior patterns that are stereotypically gendered female—like a lower likelihood of aggression, playing with dolls, and an interest in animals and literature vs. technology and math—and maps them onto Asperger's. Attwood acknowledges the stereotypical nature of these observations, however. He allows for the understanding that boys and girls are socialized differently and face different behavioral expectations, and that diagnostic disparities and differences in presentation are not necessarily due to some inherent difference between the sexes. (Not that there are only <a href="http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/body/fausto-sterling.html">two sexes</a>, but that reality is far beyond the limited scope of this book.)</p>
<p>"Girls," of course, is not a monolithic group. The contributions to this volume completely ignore race and ethnicity, and thereby unintentionally default to addressing a white readership. Class and geography, and thus their attendant issues concerning access to diagnostic and supportive resources, are ignored. Any meaningful discussion of girls' sexuality and gender expression can't afford to ignore non-straight sexualities or gender non-conforming idenities and behaviors, but this book does just that. Not only does it erase queer autistic experience by failing to acknowledge it as a reality, but it actually singles out and pathologizes certain gender non-conforming behaviors.</p>
<p>The chapter titled <em>&nbsp;</em>"Preparing for Puberty and Beyond," by Mary Wrobel, is—as one might expect, sadly—phenomenally essentialist. The author fixates on menstruation as the definitive marker of female physical maturity, erasing the experiences of people with ovaries and a uterus who nonetheless don't menstruate--or male-identified people who do--and completely denying the existence of trans girls and women. Sexual attraction is always described in terms of "the opposite sex." In one passage that completely drives me up a wall, the author asserts:</p>
<blockquote><p>It is socially appropriate for teenage girls to shave their legs and underarms. Girls who don't shave are likely to be teased and humiliated. Most neurotypical girls decide to shave on their own, but the idea of shaving may not occur to girls with Asperger's. At some point before high school, parents will need to explain the resons for shaving and carefully instruct their daughters on leg and underarm shaving.</p></blockquote>
<p>Yes, teenage girls who don't shave <em>are </em>likely to be teased and humiliated—which is <em>wrong. </em>Anyone might choose to shave or not, but the <em>expectation</em> that women shave their legs and underarms is arbitrary and oppressive. That paragraph is loaded: Are girls who don't shave simply failing to grasp "appropriate" behavior? Are unshaven legs or underarms indicative of something "wrong?" What about people who choose not to shave for reasons related to identity? Because shaving one's legs and underarms is such a gendered behavior, girls who feel more "masculine" may just not feel right shaving. Or one might find shaving uncomfortable or just something not worth her time—women don't owe society an explanation for choosing not to shave, and we don't deserve to be scrutinized and shamed over the matter. I thought feminists beat this issue to death decades ago.</p>
<p>I'm so hung up on this passage because it's a glaring example of how this book constructs adolescent girls with Asperger syndrome as naïve innocents who just need to be guided toward "appropriate" expressions of gender normativity and heterosexuality. Gender norms are never challenged, and most of the contributors apparently never even entertained the notion that girls on the spectrum might have their own thoughts about gender and sexual politics.&nbsp;</p>
<p>There is actually an entire chapter dedicated to extolling the joys of unquestioning conformity to social expectations. Called "Girl to Girl: Advice on Friendship, Bullying, and Fitting In," it's an exquisitely, excrutiatingly offensive little piece. I can't do it justice in one or two short paragraphs; it's getting a post all it's own.</p>
<p>Out of nine chapters, only three are actually written by women on the autism spectrum. All three are clustered together at the back of the book, a poignant reflection of how autistic voices are marginalized and tokenized within our own movement. "Aspie Do's and Don'ts: Dating, Relationships and Marriage," by Jennifer McIlwee Meyers, is more or less what it appears: a rambling assemblage of relationship advice for young women with Asperger's. Meyers actively deconstructs some popular attitudes toward dating and relationships, but her contribution is nonetheless disappointingly heteronormative, in keeping with the rest of the book. Ruth Snyder's "Maternal Instincts in Asperger Syndrome" is a miniature memoir detailing the author's experiences from adolescence to adulthood, dealing with abusive partners and dismissive doctors, and raising her four children. The piece is difficult to summarize, and the introductory blurb that precedes it is ickily fetishistic:</p>
<blockquote><p>Ruth Snyder's story is often painful to read, as she describes a childhood of abuse and neglect. The expression of her experiences is as significant as their content: hers is a genuine voice from the world of autism.</p></blockquote>
<blockquote><p>She's survived many betrayals—by uncaring parents who were ashamed of her; lovers who used her and left her; doctors who misdiagnosed her and her children; and unsympathetic teachers—we must marvel at her resiliency. She had never stopped looking for ways to improve her life and the lives of her children. We are so grateful she has shared her story, and believe it will enlighten all who read it.</p></blockquote>
<p>This passage echoes loudly of the <a href="/post/the-transcontinental-disability-choir-disability-archetypes-supercrip">supercrip</a> trope, and it's unclear what exactly makes Snyder's voice more "genuine" than those of the other two autistic women who contributed to the book.</p>
<p>The contribution of Temple Grandin, who is easily the most well-known of the authors, is confined to the final two and a half pages. Grandin isn't an unproblematic figure, but in the context of this particular book her chapter is probably the most subversive. In "For Me, A Good Career Gave Life Meaning," she briefly describes her experience as asexual and aromantic, and how she finds fulfillment primarily through her intellectual and working life. Grandin's is the only chapter that doesn't essentialize or perpetuate oppressive attitudes toward gender and sexuality. Interestingly, Grandin's is the only piece in which the editor has taken pains to express that she "doesn't claim to speak for all women on the spectrum."</p>
<p>All of the other chapters, to varying degrees, emphasize autistic women's "vulnerability" to "predators." While, as I have pointed out multiple times in previous posts, disabled women <em>are </em>far more likely than non-disabled women to be victims of sexual assault, this book places the onus of avoiding victimization on girls and their parents instead of confronting the structural reality of rape culture. This attitude, combined with a complete ignorance of intersectionality and the contributors' fixation on menstruation and (heterosexual) dating, makes the collection feel bizarrely out of touch. The topic of autism and gender does warrant analysis, but this particular book—despite being touted as "ground-breaking"—falls short of that task because it seems to have borrowed its gender politics from <a href="/post/bitch-radio-this-land-is-girl-land-audio-podcast-feminist" target="_blank">Caitlin Flanagan</a>.</p>
<p><strong>Previously:</strong> <a href="/post/double-rainbow-aspergers-autism-literature-attwood" target="_blank">Tony Attwood tells us to "make lemonade," </a><a href="/post/double-rainbow-autism-vs-asperger-syndrome" target="_blank">Autism vs. Asperger Syndrome</a></p>
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http://bitchmagazine.org/post/double-rainbow-aspergers-and-girls-feminism-autism-books#commentsAsperger syndromegenderBooksTue, 07 Feb 2012 19:55:31 +0000Caroline Narby15149 at http://bitchmagazine.org